Tzeni Karezi
Movie Actress
One of the most admired actresses in the history of Greek cinema, she starred in The Red Lanterns, a movie that was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 1963 Academy Awards.
She studied with playwright Angelos Terzakis and director Dimitris Rontiris at the Greek National Theater.
Her 1963 film The Red Lanterns brought her international acclaim.
She and her second husband, Greek actor, director, and politician Kostas Kazakos, were briefly imprisoned for their participation in the 1973 play Our Big Circus, which was deemed a mockery of the Greek dictatorship.
Her involvement in theater continued after her retirement from film acting, and she appeared in such productions as Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Euripides' Medea, and Sophocles' Electra.